CHPS Adds New Board Members from Coast to Coast

New reps hail from nation’s second largest school district, fortune 500 company and Massachusetts’ school construction agency

July 14, 2010 (San Francisco, CA) – The Collaborative for High Performance Schools (CHPS), a green schools non-profit, has expanded its Board of Directors by adding three new representatives from across the country. Katherine Craven from the Massachusetts School Building Authority, Gwenn McDaniel from Johnson Controls, and Mud Baron from the Los Angeles Unified School District were voted onto the Board of Directors at the most recent Board of Directors meeting.

“Over the last eight years, CHPS has grown its impact with schools and districts across the US, and our Board of Directors has led the way in seeking a national presence for CHPS,” said Chip Fox, chair of the CHPS Board of Directors, and New Construction Manager of Sempra Utilities. “Gwen, Katherine and Mud add depth and breadth to the school expertise and state representation on our already strong Board of Directors. We welcome their perspectives and leadership as our board continues to define a bright future for CHPS and high performance schools across America.”

After serving as both deputy budget director for the House Committee on Ways and Means and Director of Policy for the Massachusetts House of Representatives, Katherine Craven was appointed as the first Executive Director of the Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) in 2004. In this role, Ms. Craven built an independent state agency that determines the most fiscally responsible and appropriate solutions to create safe learning environments. She also established a “Pro-Pay” system to reimburse districts for construction costs and oversaw the creation of the MSBA’s Model School Program, which simplifies the design process by adapting design elements from successful, recently constructed schools.

Gwenn McDaniel was appointed as the director of K-12 solutions at Johnson Controls, the global leader in delivering products, services and solutions that increase efficiency in buildings, in September 2008. In this role, she leads the creation and implementation of solutions for school facilities that enhance the learning environment and directly impact student and teacher performance. McDaniel has more than 25 years of industry experience and has served as a high school teacher of chemistry and physics. She graduated from the University of North Carolina at Asheville and is currently pursuing her MBA with Clemson University.

Mud Baron is the Green Policy Director for Los Angeles Unified School District school board member Marguerite P. La Motte. In this role, he helps groups to make schools and schoolyards truly greener and healthier. His current endeavors include co-producing GOOD magazine's school garden design contest, co-producing the USDA People’s Garden School Garden Film Festival, planning the American Horticultural Society's Youth Gardening Symposium, co-producing the Green Schoolyard Display and Agenda at the annual Green School Summit, and green-lining South Los Angeles schools by putting in gardens, trees and green space in place of asphalt, concrete, and chain-link fences.

CHPS is a 501(c)(3) non-profit headquartered in San Francisco. For more information about CHPS, visit www.chps.net.

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The Collaborative for High Performance Schools created the nation’s first green building rating program developed especially for school learning environments. The mission of CHPS is to make schools better places to learn by facilitating the design, construction and operation of a new generation of high performance schools - places of learning that are environmentally sustainable, healthy and comfortable.